Symon Dowell, an MSci Forensic Science student, tells us about his exciting placement in Germany. 

In my final year of my Forensic Science MSci undergraduate degree it is a requirement to conduct a three-month placement. This can be in research, a work placement, or a mixture of the two, inside or outside of Staffordshire University. My placement, in ballistic imaging, is to develop a database for statistical modelling and forensic firearm identification. The placement will consist of using the ScannBi Evofinder to image fired test samples sent by firearm experts from all over the world.
In order to conduct my placement Dr Rachel Bolton-King and I travelled to Lübeck, Germany, to conduct training on the Evofinder, being taught by the company, ScannBi. A huge thank you to everyone at ScannBi but especially to Aleksandr Skvortsov for being an excellent trainer. The ScannBi Technology company was founded by a group of specialists in different fields to create an effective tool for ballistic expertise.

Miniaturised aerial view of Lübeck

The training started from the very basics of the Evofinder system teaching us how to use the system, and what every single icon does on the software and when we would need to use them. A cassette is used to hold the bullet or cartridge case in place and is inserted into the Evofinder. There are many different adaptors available to hold the samples in place and we were taught which component to use with different types of samples. We also got to have plenty of hands on practise with the Evofinder, imaging some samples which were in good condition with easily identifiable impressions to other samples with very little visible impressions or were just fragments of a bullet, which were interesting to image but required more skill with the equipment to image them properly.

This was my first experience of being taught outside the UK and working in a technology company environment. Although I was nervous, I was also very excited to learn about their technology and to be able to use it confidently and hopefully competently. It was very interesting listening and speaking to both the ScannBi owner, their employees and Rachel regarding ballistic examination around the world.
The training took place during normal working hours, 9am to 5pm, meaning all other time outside of this was ours. This allowed us to travel around the wonderfully colourful German Christmas markets, of which there were many, with a variety of different stalls, with the main theme of food, drink (some alcoholic of course!) or crafted objects, or a mixture of the three. Every lunchtime we would walk to the same café which served some amazing food, and, in the evenings, we would dine on food from the Christmas markets. Except, after the first day of training the ScannBi Company kindly invited us out for a very delicious meal.

Conducting this training has not only given me the skills to be able to use the Evofinder competently but has given me the confidence to be able to travel to a new environment and be taught by professionals, learning new information, developing existing and new skills.

‘The ScannBi Technology company was founded by a group of specialists in different fields to create an effective tool for ballistic expertise.’

I chose to apply for this work placement with Rachel because I wanted to do something that would be fun and interesting, and I did not have a clear idea as to what I want to do after my university degree. Therefore, I decided to go for an area where I have little experience in. The requirements for this placement were to have good attention to detail and to be able to carry out repetitive work sticking to operational guidelines, but it was not necessary to have a vast knowledge of ballistic examination.
The alternative option

for conducting this training would have been for Rachel to attend the training alone and to teach me at the start of my placement in January. This would have given me a free week back in December to go on holiday, relax and enjoy the start of the Christmas break not conducting any work. However, this was never an option for me, I wanted the experience of traveling to a new country and to learn new information. I am glad I went to Germany, as I thoroughly enjoyed every minute of the trip and would recommend to anyone else in this situation to conduct the training first-hand instead of the alternative.

My advice to anyone who is currently on the Forensic Science/Investigation MSci course or anyone looking at changing to the MSci course or doing a placement year apply for something different, potentially out of your comfort zone as you may never of thought of doing that area in the future but after doing your placement that’s exactly what you could be doing. Also, like myself, you may get the chance to travel abroad and receive training, or conduct research, and add a new experience to your CV.

You may have read our blog piece about Jacqueline McDermott’s experiences on an ERASMUS placement in Italy. The Forensic Investigation student was at Istituto di Scienze Forensi in Italy, one of our EFEN partner companies (the European Forensic Education Network).

She has now written an article about her experiences, which has been published in Interfaces, a newsletter publication from The Chartered Society of Forensic Sciences.

The Society states that “The aim of Interfaces is to keep readers up to date with Society developments. Interfaces contains articles submitted by members, current Society updates, book reviews, events information and more.”

In the piece, Jacqueline explains that “while working at ISF, I have been given the opportunity to get real experience of what working as a Forensic Consultant entails. I have received many opportunities to expand my knowledge theoretically on areas such as road traffic reconstructions, fire investigation, 3D reconstructions and anti-counterfeiting. I have then applied this newfound knowledge practically to real-life scenarios. Throughout my time at ISF I have visited fire scenes, where I have had to take a series of photographs and make my own analysis on
points of origin and what caused the fire.”.

Congratulations Jacqueline, on your placement and publication.

You can read her entry, ‘An Italian ERASMUS Experience’, here:

CSFS_Interfaces_Issue_97_Mar19

Associate Professor, Dr Claire Gwinnett, became an adviser for Closer Magazine Group in January. 

This month, Claire was featured in a new magazine from the group called Crime Monthly. It focuses on a ‘day in the life of a Forensic Scientist’.

Last week, fourteen of our undergraduate Forensic Science and Forensic Investigation students presented their research at the British Conference of Undergraduate Research at the University of South Wales.

The annual conference, which took place on the 15th-16th April, is held at different universities each year and allows undergraduate students to present their research in a variety of disciplines (read about last year’s here).

The students present their final-year project research in a digital or poster format.

Kirsty Chevannes presenting her research on the Evaluation of Methods Used Within Forensic Anthropology in Comparison to Digital Methods

Mauricio Chase discussing his research into The Development and Evaluation of Fingermarks on Firearms from Areas Frequently Handled

Symon Dowell investigated Whether Cutting Agents within Seized Cocaine Affects Quantifiation by HPLC. 

Stacey White presented on The Tertiary Transfer and Persistence of Biological Evidence in Child Sexual Offence Cases. 

Jessica Woodman – An Investigation into Whether the Partial Drying of Blood Drops Can Aid in the Determination of Sequence of Events of a Crime 

Gareth Griffiths – A Validation Study of Faro Zone 3D for Blood Pattern Analysis

Rodgers Nyika – A Verification into the Effects that Different Temperatures and Substrate Types have on the Effectiveness of Fingermark Development 

Rebecca Johnston carried out her research on The Migration of Volatile Organic Compounds through Various Polymer Membranes in Relation to Analysis of Arson Related Materials. 

Mollie Barker presented her poster showing her work on The Creation of an Assessment Tool for Heat Damage to Textiles 

Matthew Ballam-Davies presented his research about The Determination of Pedestrian Throw Types using Small-Scale Reconstruction

Lucy Colley – The Use of Non-Destructive Methods to Detect and Measure GSR Spread for the Estimation of Firing Distance at Close Range 

Leah Ashton conducted her research project on the Chemical Interpretation of Post Mortem Submersion Interval Changes in Murine Models

Katie Evers – A Prediction of Textile Damage from Acid Attacks to Aid the Reconstruction of Events 

Danielle Smith – Determining if Common Child Abuse Injuries are Still Visible on hard and Soft Tissues after Burial 

Well done to everyone who attended and presented their research; what a valuable experience! 

Dean Northfield (Forensic Investigation Course Leader, 6th from left) at the conference with our students

Last Wednesday afternoon, The Forensic and Crime Science Society (FACS) held the eighth-annual, student-led conference in the Science Centre. 

Students from the FACS Society, including President Aimee Girdham (second from left), with Guest Speaks Deneen L Hernandez (centre) and Dr Maria MacLennan (second form right).

Aimee Girdham, the President of the FACS Society and a level 6 Forensic Investigation student, explains that the “society is run alongside the Criminal Justice and Forensic Science [department within the School of Law, Policing and Forensics].

“We organise events throughout the year including Escape Rooms and the end of year ball, but most importantly we organise the annual Student-Led Conference. We invite external guest speakers to present alongside current Level 6 students to present their project work. It’s a great afternoon to network with a wide range of people from a variety of forensic disciplines.”

Dr Rachel Bolton-King (centre) with Guest Speakers Deneen L Hernandez (left) and Dr Maria MacLennan (right)

You can watch Associate Professor, Dr Rachel Bolton-King talk about the event on the School of Law, Policing and Forensics Facebook page here.

The event opened at 1pm, where level six undergraduate students, Olivia Hodgetts, Mauricio Chase, Tina Kaur and Anthony Smart, presented their project research. 

Olivia Hodgetts presenting her research on Blood Pattern Analysis and the effects of alcohol on blood. 

Tina Kaur has researched the impact of a speculum and specimen capture device in semen recovery rates during sexual offence examinations

Anthony Smart presented on the impact of heating bone following a knife injury to determine whether you can determine temperature of heating or knife type

“Level 6 students, Olivia Hodgetts, Mauricio Chase, Tina Kaur and Anthony Smart presented their research from their Independent Project which I hope was inspiring to the Level 4 students in getting them to think about the different Forensics areas and the process that’s involved in completing the project for them to make their own decision next year.”

Mark Broadhead and Robin Parsons, two PhD Researchers, also presented their research on Firearms and Ballistics and DNA AND Fingerprint Recovery.

Robin Parson, PhD Researcher (DNA Fingerprint and Recovery)

Mark Broadhead, PhD Researcher (Firearms and Ballistics)

The students were delighted to have four, external Guest Speakers accept their invitation to present on a range of topics about various forensic disciplines. 

Dr Anna Williams, Forensic Anthropologist at the University of Huddersfield

Deneen L Hernandez, Forensic Examiner in the FBI

Forensic Jewellery with Dr Maria MacLennan

Jonathan Allen, Forensic Presentation Officer at West Midlands Police

“It was an intellectual afternoon with great turn out from external guest speakers from a range of forensic disciplines, including a Forensic Examiner from the FBI, a Forensic Jeweller, Forensic Anthropologist who discussed her lead on establishing a human taphonomy facility in the U.K, and a Forensic Presentation Officer who uses 3D scanning to scan the crime scene and turn it into a 3D image to be used in the courtroom for the jury.”

Twenty-five students from University College Leuven Limburg visited us at Staffordshire University, Stoke Campus, for three days in March in order to take part in a Crime Scene Evidence Analysis short course. 

The students signed up to the short course after seeing a guest lecture by Associate Professor, Dr Claire Gwinnett at University College Leuven Limburg last March. The visit was organised so the students could get hands-on crime scene investigation (CSI) experience.

Day 1

The first day provided an overview of crime scene documentation, photography, packaging and evidence handling with Dr Claire Gwinnett and PhD Researcher Laura Wilkinson. A lot of examples were shown and discussions were had about the best way to preserve evidence. The day ended with a fingerprint powering session to brush up skills for their crime scene investigations. 

Day 2

CSI teams of five students were each given a case scenario, ranging from a missing persons investigation, potential kidnapping and assault and murder. They aspent four hours at the crime scene house investigating their case – some were focused on a bedroom scene, others in the kitchen and lounge and others investigating a vehicle outside.  

The teams had to work together to identify, document and retrieve evidence ready for future analysis. Later that day, teams created forensic strategies for the investigation and the analysis of the evidence, prioritising evidence so as to enable the ‘what, when, where, who, how and why’ questions to be answered. Our UCLL interns Bart Bogaerts and Koen Geurts, who are here at Staffs till June conducting research, helped out at the crime scene house with evidence packaging.

Day 3

Evidence analysis day meant the teams had to identify the analysis techniques and tests that they wanted to conduct on their evidence: including body fluids identification, presumptive testing of drugs, document analysis (using VSC), ink analysis (using Raman Spectroscopy), hair and glass analysis, chemical development of fingermarks and Electrostatic Detection Apparatus for ID of the presence of any indentations on paper evidence and DNA submissions.

Each team could only submit three items for DNA analysis, meaning that the evidential value of each item of evidence had to be scrutinised and an effective forensic strategy developed. 

Teams collated their findings and presented these via an ideas board to the rest of the course with the team delivering the most accurate and well thought-out interpretation of the case winning a prize

Mica Tolosa-Wright, BSc (Hons) Forensic Science alumni, has been in touch to show us what exciting things she has been doing since graduating from Staffordshire University. 

“Research Technician Mica, of the National Heart and Lung Institute, won the 2018 President’s Award for Research Support Excellence for her work at the Tuberculosis (TB) Research Centre.

Mica was nominated for a number of achievements, including being the primary laboratory supervisor for a Master of Research (MRes) student, and training in containment level 3 laboratory protocols in order to independently deal with highly-infectious TB samples.

Mica is now working on a new research MRC funded study, investigating the immunological response for implementation of Live Attenuated Influenza Vaccination (LAIV), and has started a part-time Master’s in Genomic Medicine at Imperial. We spoke to Mica about her reflections on winning the President’s Award for Excellence.”  Read the full article here.